At a high-level special event held during the September 2009 UN General Assembly, world leaders pledged more than US $5 billion in multi-year funding and committed to a new global Consensus for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health. The event, Investing in Our Common Future: Healthy Women, Healthy Children, was hosted by U.K. Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Robert Zoellick, President of The World Bank. Mr. Brown and Mr. Zoellick proposed innovative measures to finance health programmes for women and children in developing countries. The UK and other donors set out their commitment to support countries in scrapping health “user fees,” which could ensure millions of people will be able to visit health professionals for free for services ranging from basic check-ups to life-saving treatment, and Burundi, Ghana, Liberia, Malawi, Nepal, and Sierra Leone announced that they will expand access to health services, giving 10 million more people access to free health care.
Saving Lives
Up to half a million women and three million newborn babies die each year in pregnancy and childbirth or soon afterwards, the majority of them in Africa and South Asia. For every woman who dies at least twenty more suffer complications which leave them with lifelong disability and pain.
Our unique programmes are saving the lives of mothers and babies every day. We need you to help us to equip women with their most vital survival tool: knowledge.
